Welcome to our new series, Beyond The Chair. We discuss issues facing today’s practice owner, and how to stay competitive in your market. Our discussion this week focuses on the Darkside of Dentistry.

This week, here’s what you’ll learn:

The unfortunate reason why some industry “experts” have polluted the profession by preaching that marketing and selling are bad, and all you have to do is a “good dentist” to attract patients… despite the fact that (ethical) marketing is the fastest and only predictable way to grow your practice and help more patients

Benjamin: Hi, my name is Benjamin Portnoy, I’m the Director of Marketing for Local Search for Dentists®, here is Graig Presti, the C.E.O. of Local Search for Dentists®, we’re here again in Graig’s backyard talking about Dental Marketing.

And what we’re going to start off with today is a fun topic and it’s got a funny name and that is the Dark Side of Dentistry. This doesn’t mean Darth Vader comes in and helps you do dentistry with his lightsaber. What this is all about, why don’t you tell us what the Dark Side of Dentistry is.

Graig: Yeah, the Dark Side of Dentistry is really the portion of the marketplace and the portion of dentists who view marketing and selling as bad or evil, and that really it has that negative connotation with it, and they’re really polluting other dentists’ minds with that marketing is bad, selling is bad, right, and that you shouldn’t do it because…

Benjamin: Polluting their own minds.

Graig: Polluting their own minds with that you shouldn’t do it, and here’s why you shouldn’t do it because you’re not a used car salesman type of thing, and that spread like a virus.

I mean that’s sort of like that thing that is just, it can break out through a community of dentists very, very quickly and it’s unfortunate and it’s slightly sad because it’s not true and that’s why we named the Dark Side of Dentistry, is because that really paints a very, very dark picture of what the truth really, really is.

Benjamin: And what is the truth?

Graig: And the truth is that marketing and selling is a vehicle that allows you to educate and help more patients that you otherwise wouldn’t be able to do without it. And I think I understand why marketing and selling gets a bad rap in the dental space.

Because there are some people who do teach some tactics that are a little bit inappropriate, we’ll say.

Benjamin: OK.

Graig: Selling has a bad connotation to it right? We all think of I got to go to the car dealership and oh my gosh, “I got a deal with Bobby who is going to squeeze me into a room and he’s going to put a bunch of pressure on me, and you know and that’s bad selling, that’s bad selling.”

When we talk about marketing and selling for the purposes of a dental practice is we talk about marketing and selling from an informative and education-based system that allows other folks to make decisions that they wouldn’t otherwise make on their own, because that is the crux of what selling is, right?

Think about when you really made a purchase that you really enjoyed. You enjoyed the process, you enjoyed working and talking with the person; it might be a lab person that comes to your practice, it might be a vendor that works on your house, right? Think about that process and how comforting it was and at the end you guys exchanged money for service. He or she sold you. It didn’t feel like they sold you, because he or she was informative and polite, no pressure. That’s the selling and marketing that we teach our docs how to do and that we recommend.

And you know, it’s sort of like a few bad apples ruin the bunch for the rest of them.

Benjamin: Yeah.

Graig: And they’re doing a disservice by making it such a negative thing, because the reality of that is that you get to help more people when you can market and sell to more people.

I mean, look at you know, we did another segment about implant patients and helping them change their lives. Well, without marketing and selling, they’re not going to be in front of you to get a better health, it’s not going to happen.

Benjamin: This really comes back, we’ve talked on these different segments, a lot about changing your mindset in order to help achieve what it is that you’re trying to get. A lot of people look at marketing as this sort of isolated, modular thing and sales is this other modular, disparate thing.

But ultimately it should all fall under the same umbrella, which is that people do business with those and it is said over and over again — those they know, like and trust. And part of selling — it should be under that same umbrella. That it’s really a matter of educating that it’s part of who you are, you’re not you don’t need to put on your sales person hat when it’s time to tell somebody about implants, or veneers, or anything else,. That this is just part of, I think, “this would be beneficial to you and here’s why, as a patient, here’s why I think this would be beneficial to you, it’s your choice whether or not to take it but it’s not that I have this thing, it costs three thousand dollars and I want to sell it to somebody.”

Graig: Yeah, right. You are shoving it down their throat and putting a bunch of pressure on them. And I think that’s important because when it comes to marketing and selling, there is a handshake; marketing is the vehicle that gets the patient into your office so you can present a case to them or you can help them — that’s marketing. Marketing is not a brochure…it’s not a website, that’s not marketing. Marketing is utilizing something that makes someone take action to pick up the phone or fill out a form, that then they book an appointment and show up in your business.

At that point, once they’re in your business, that’s when the selling takes place.

Now, that’s sort of where that you hear me say “selling” and almost I bet that people watching this almost cringe a little bit when I say it, but when I say “selling”, I mean it in an education based way. Everyone in your practice is selling; selling themselves, selling your business…in the best light that they can, right?

Everyone from the person who answers the phone, to the hygienist in the operatories where are doing their jobs; they’re all selling your brand, your practice. They all need to be trained on how to speak, how to say certain things, and if you’re not training them, you need to be training them.

Because that being said, if you listen to your hygienist today talk to a patient; the patient may have a severe problem, right? Maybe they have a lot of decay in their mouth or maybe hopefully nothing worse than that, but if your hygienist is not doing education-based selling, in an appropriate way, do they really know how bad their situation is?

Do they really understand that if “I let this go, it’s going to be extremely painful, the treatment time’s going to be longer, it’s going to cost more money and all the health issues that come along with those things”?

If your hygienist is not teaching them and educating them on that, which is selling by the way, you’re doing a disservice. That patient is not going to understand. Now, there’s no pressure involved in that, that’s still selling right?

They’re not saying, “Oh, if you don’t leave this chair you’re going to you know, all these bad things you know,”…you’re not trying to guilt them into it either, which is something that if you’re not training your hygiene team on how to properly talk to patients then you need to. Talking about the weather and all that’s fine, but there’s appropriate times to interject, “Hey, we’re seeing this and you know it’s OK, we can totally take care of everything but you need to know about these things.”

And without that education-based in the form of a selling. You’re really doing a disservice to the patient and that’s what we’re talking about when we’re talking about selling. So we’re not talking about putting them in a vacuum and trying to pressurize the situation.

I want to help you put an action plan together to get your practice moving in the right direction. Do NOT be a stick in the mud, who refuses to change. This year can be that year for change. Let’s do it!

One word of WARNING: This action plan will disappear with out notice! So don’t delay.

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